Navy Pier → Joliet
September 30, 2026
Distance: ~40–45 nautical miles
Waterway / State: Chicago River → Chicago Sanitary & Ship Canal → Des Plaines River — Illinois
Locks: 2 — Chicago Harbor, Lockport | 2 total so far
Notable: Our first locks, first real exposure to heavy commercial river traffic, railroad-bridge delays and our first night tied to a wall.
The Trip
We left Navy Pier around 8:00 in the morning and headed almost immediately toward our first new experience of the day: the Chicago Harbor Lock.
It was our first lock ever, and thankfully a pretty easy introduction. We simply held onto the lines while the water level dropped only about four or five feet, and before long we were through and entering the Chicago River.
Then came what people call the skyscraper canyon.
Even with gray skies and some rain, going through downtown Chicago by boat was pretty incredible. The buildings rose up on both sides of us, river taxis moved around the channel, and for stretches it felt like we had much of the river to ourselves.
We had the GoPro running for much of it, although the rain kept putting water on the lens. Greg eventually set up his iPhone inside the windshield too, which worked better as long as we remembered to use the windshield wipers.
We also got our first real taste of close-quarters river traffic. At one point, a river taxi came up behind us and gave a single horn blast indicating it wanted to pass on our starboard side. We heard it, but not quite well enough to immediately understand what was happening, so there was another little lesson in river communication.
And then we saw our first massive barge coming upstream.
Everything about the day felt different from Lake Michigan.
Bridges, Locks and Waiting
Farther down the river, we caught up with a couple of other Looper boats at an Amtrak bridge that had us waiting for trains to pass before it could open.
They had already been waiting quite a while by the time we arrived. We waited another 15 minutes or so and called the bridge, and eventually they let us know they just needed a couple more trains to get through before raising it.
Then came the Lockport Lock.
This was our first larger lock with floating bollards. We had heard that Loopers liked them, but we had never really understood why.
What we had heard repeatedly was one very strong rule about locks: never tie your line back to a cleat on the boat, because if the water level changes while the line is fixed, the line can lift or pull the boat in ways you definitely don’t want.
So when we got onto the floating bollard and were told it was okay to secure the line back to our cleat, Greg was understandably a little uncomfortable with the idea. A lockmaster finally had to assure us that yes, in this case it really was okay.
Then it made perfect sense.
The bollard itself moves up or down with the water—and with the boat—so the line isn’t being left behind at a fixed point on the wall. You still need to watch it and be ready to release it if something hangs up, but once we understood that distinction, floating bollards immediately became our preferred way to lock through.
It was another good example of learning that a boating rule can be completely correct in one situation and not apply the same way in another.
We had expected about an hour wait but ended up getting through in less time than that. Several other boats had gathered by then, so we were all maneuvering around outside the lock waiting our turn.
By this point, the transition from the Great Lakes to the river system was very real.
The Experience
Just outside Joliet, we came to the Joliet Wall, where a number of Loopers were already tied up.
Getting Breaking Awave onto the wall was not especially graceful.
Several people were trying to help us find a spot, but the first opening was pretty tight between two boats and the current kept pushing the stern away from the wall. Greg tried to work the boat in, but there wasn’t enough control to make that particular spot work comfortably.
So we backed out, turned around and came back upstream for another approach.
It was a little chaotic, but eventually we got tied up safely.
Once settled, we talked with some of the other boats about the next morning. Several of us would be leaving early for Brandon Road Lock, so we agreed on a 7:00 AM departure.
There was also another reason we were glad to be there.
One of the informal milestones we had been watching was getting through Chicago by around October 1. A major closure at Brandon Road had originally threatened to complicate our timing, although that closure was eventually postponed. Either way, we had made it through Chicago on September 30 and were officially into the rivers.
The bigger schedule was also starting to sit in the back of our minds. We wanted to make the AGLCA Fall Rendezvous in Orange Beach on November 5, and we already knew we hadn’t given ourselves a huge amount of extra time. We weren’t panicking about it yet, but getting through Chicago and continuing south without unnecessary delays mattered.
After getting tied up, we both opened our laptops for a while. Julie caught up on aFit work, while Greg worked on organizing the photography setup and building the folder structure for all the photos we had accumulated since the beginning of the adventure.
Then it was an early night.
We had locks waiting for us in the morning.
At the Helm
This day had a little bit of everything new: our first lock, our first real city river traffic, bridge waits, floating bollards, a major barge and our first attempt at tying Breaking Awave to a wall with current pushing against us.
None of it was individually overwhelming, but together it made the day feel like a pretty big transition.
The biggest lesson at Joliet was probably that docking on a wall with current is very different from pulling into a normal marina slip. When the first approach wasn’t working, the better answer was simply to get out of it, reset and try again rather than force the boat into a bad situation.
We were definitely still learning.
But by the end of the day, we had gone from Lake Michigan boating to river boating in a hurry.
Today’s Route
[Nebo route visual]
Today in Pictures
[Leaving Navy Pier, Chicago Harbor Lock, skyscraper canyon, river traffic and barges, bridge wait, Lockport Lock, floating bollards, Joliet Wall and Breaking Awave tied up for the night]